Shenac's Work at Home Part 26

"I used to fret about it, Dan; but that is all past. It does not matter, as I am lying now. I would not change my weakness for your strength to-day, dear lad."

A last bright ray of sunlight lighted up the fair, smiling face, and flecked with golden gleams the curls that lay about it. There came into Dan's mind thoughts of the time when Hamish was a little lad, strong and merry as any of them all; and his heart was moved with vague wonder and regret at the mystery that had changed his happy life to one of suffering and comparative helplessness. And yet, what did it matter, now that the end had come? Perhaps all that trouble and pain had helped to make the brightness of to-day, for there was no shadow in the dying eyes, no regret for the past, no fear for the future. He let his own eyes wander from his brother's face away to the clouds and the sinking sun and the illuminated forest, with a vague notion that, if his feelings were not suppressed, he should do dishonour to his manliness soon. Hamish touched his hand, as he said,--

"It looks dark to you, Dan, with the shadow of death drawing nearer and nearer; but it is only a shadow, lad, only a shadow, and I am not afraid."

Dan felt that he must break down if he met that smile a moment longer, and, with a sudden wrench, he turned himself away; but he could not have spoken a word, if his reputation for strength had depended on it.

Hamish spoke first.

"Sit down, lad, if you are not needed, and read a while to me, till Shenac comes back again."

"All right," said Dan. He could endure it with something to do, he thought. "What book, Hamish?"

"There is only one book now, Dan, lad," said Hamish as he lifted the little, worn Bible from the window-seat.

Dan could do several things better than he could read, but he took the book from his brother's hand. Even reading would be better than silence--more easily borne.

"Anywhere, I suppose?" said he.

The book opened naturally at a certain place, where it had often been opened before, and he read:--

"Therefore being justified by faith, we have peace with G.o.d through our Lord Jesus Christ."

The sigh of satisfaction with which Hamish laid himself back, as the words came slowly, said more to Dan than a sermon could have done. He read on, thinking, as verse by verse pa.s.sed his lips, "That is for Hamish," till he came to this:--

"For if when we were enemies we were reconciled to G.o.d by the death of his Son, much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by his life."

"Was this for Hamish only?" Dan's voice was not quite smooth through this verse; it quite broke down when he tried the next; and then his face was hidden, and the sobs that had been gathering all this time burst forth.

"Why, Dan, lad! what is it, Dan?" said Hamish; and the thin, transparent fingers struggled for a moment to withdraw the great, brown, screening hands from his eyes. Then his arm was laid across his brother's neck.

"They are all for you, Dan, as well as for me," he murmured. "O Dan, do not sob like that. Look up, dear brother, I have something to say to you."

If I were to report the broken words that followed, they might not seem to have much meaning or weight; but, falling from those dear dying lips, they came with power to the heart of Dan. And this was but the beginning. The veil being once lifted from Dan's heart, he did not shrink again from his brother's gentle and faithful ministrations.

There were few days after that in which the brothers were not left alone together for a little while. Though the days were not many, in Dan's life they counted more than all the years that had gone before.

The harvest was drawing to a close before the last day came. The dawn was breaking after a long and weary night More than once, during the slowly-pa.s.sing hours, Shenac had turned to the door to call her brothers; but thoughts of the long laborious day restrained her, and now a little respite had come. Hamish slumbered peacefully. It was not very long, however, before his eyes opened on his sister's face with a smile.

"It is drawing nearer, my Shenac," he murmured.

Her answering smile was tearful, but very bright.

"Yes, it is drawing nearer."

"And you do not grudge me to my rest, dear?"

"No; even at my worst time I did not do that. For myself, the way looked weary; but at the very worst time I was glad for you."

The brightness of her tearful smile never changed till his weary eyes closed again. The day pa.s.sed slowly. They thought him dying in the afternoon, and they all gathered in his room; but he revived, and when night came he was left alone with Shenac. There were others up in the house all night, and now and then a face looked in at the open door; but they slept, or seemed to sleep--Shenac in the great chair, with her head laid on her brother's pillow and her bright hair mingling with his. On her cheek, pale with watching and with awe of the presence that overshadowed them, one thin, white hand was laid. The compressed lips and dimmed eyes of Hamish never failed to smile as in answer to his touch she murmured some tender word--not her own, but _His_ whose words alone can avail when it comes to a time like this.

As the day dawned they gathered again--first Dan, then Allister and Shenac Dhu, then Flora and the little lads; for the change which cannot be mistaken had come to the dying face, and they waited in silence for the King's messenger. He slumbered peacefully with a smile upon his lips, but his eyes opened at last and fastened on his sister's face.

She had never moved through the coming in of them all; she did not move now, but spoke his name.

"Hamish, bhodach!"

Did he see her?

"How bright it is in the west! It will be a fair day for the harvest to-morrow."

It must have been a glimpse of the "glory to be revealed" breaking through the dimness of death; for he did not see the dear face so close to his, and if he heard her voice, he was past all answering now. Just once again his lips moved, murmuring a name--the dearest of all--"Jesus;" and then he "saw him as he is."

CHAPTER NINETEEN.

And having closed the once beaming eyes and straightened the worn limbs for the grave, Shenac's work at home was done. Through the days of waiting that followed, she sat in the great chair with folded hands.

Many came and went, and lingered night and day in the house of death, as is the custom of this part of the country, now happily pa.s.sing away; and through all the coming and going Shenac sat still. Sometimes she roused herself to answer the friends who came with well-meant sympathy; but oftener she sat silent, scarcely seeming to hear their words. She was "_resting_," she said to Dan, who watched her through those days with wistful and anxious eyes.

Yes, she was resting from the days and nights of watching, and from the labours and cares and anxieties of the years that had gone before. All her weariness seemed to fall upon her at once. Even when death enters the door, the cares and duties of such a household cannot be altogether laid aside. There was much to do with so many comers and goers; but there were helpful hands enough, and she took no part in the necessary work, but rested.

She took little heed of the preparations going on about her--different in detail, but in all the sad essentials the same, in hut and hall, at home and abroad--the preparations for burying our dead out of our sight.

During the first day, Allister and his wife said, thankfully, to each other, "How calm she is!" The next day they said it a little anxiously.

Then they watched for the reaction, feeling sure it must come, and longing that it should be over.

"It will be now," said Shenac Dhu as they brought in the coffin; and she waited at her sister's door to hear her cry out, that she might weep with her. But it was not then; nor afterwards, when the long, long procession moved away from the house so slowly and solemnly; nor when they stood around the open grave in the kirkyard. When the first clod fell on the coffin--oh, heart-breaking sound!--Dan made one blind step towards Shenac, and would have fallen but for Angus Dhu. Little Flora cried out wildly, and her sister held her fast. She did not shriek, nor swoon, nor break into weeping, as did Shenac Dhu; but "her face would never be whiter," said they who saw it, and many a kindly and anxious eye followed her as the long line of mourners slowly turned on their homeward way again.

After the first day or two, Shenac tried faithfully to fall back into her old household ways--or, rather, she tried to settle into some helpful place in her brother's household. The wheel was put to use again, and, indeed, there was need, for all things had lagged a little during the summer; and Shenac did her day's work, and more, as she used to do. She strove to be interested in the discussions of ways and means which Allister's wife was so fond of holding, but she did not always strive successfully. It was a weariness to her; everything was a weariness at times. It was very wrong, she said, and very strange, for she really did wish to be useful and happy in her brother's household.

She thought little of going away now; she had not the heart for it. The thought of beginning some new, untried work made her weary, and the thought of going away among strangers made her afraid.

When it was suggested that she and little Flora should pay a long-promised visit to their uncle, at whose house Hamish had pa.s.sed so many weeks, and that they should go soon, that they might have the advantage of the fine autumn weather, she shrank from the proposal in dismay.

"Not yet, Allister," she pleaded; "I shall like it by-and-by, but not yet."

So nothing of the kind was urged again. They made a mistake, however.

A change of some kind was greatly needed by her at this time. Her brother's long illness and death had been a greater strain on her health and spirits than any one dreamed. She was not ill, but she was in that state when if she had been left to herself, or had had nothing to do, she might have become ill, or have grown to fancy herself so, which is a worse matter often, and worse to cure. As it was, with her good const.i.tution and naturally cheerful spirit, she would have recovered herself in time, even if something had not happened to rouse and interest her.

But something did happen. Shenac went one fair October afternoon over the fields to the beech woods to gather nuts with Flora and the young lads, and before they returned a visitor had arrived. They fell in with Dan on their way home, and as they came in sight of the house, chatting together eagerly, there was something like the old light in Shenac's eye and the old colour in her cheek. If she had known whose eyes were watching her from the parlour window, she would hardly have lingered in the garden while the children spread their nuts on the old house-floor to dry. She did not know till she went into the house--into the room.

She did not know till he was holding her hands in his, that Mr Stewart had come.

"Shenac, good, dear child, is it well with you?"

She had heard the words before. All the scene came back--the remembrance of the summer days, her dying brother and his friend--all that had happened since then. She strove to answer him--to say it was well, that she was glad to see him, and why had he not come before? But she could not for her tears. She struggled hard; but, long restrained, they came in a flood now. When she felt that to struggle was vain, she would have fled; but she was held fast, and the tears were suffered to have way for a while. When she could find voice, she said,--

"I am not grieving too much; you must not think that. Ask Allister. I did not mean to cry, but when I saw you it all came back."

Again her face was hidden, for her tears would not be stayed; but only one hand was given to the work. Mr Stewart held the other firmly, while he spoke just such words as she needed to hear of her brother and herself--of all they had been to each other, of all that his memory would be to her in the life that might lie before her. Then he spoke of the endless life which was before them, which they should pa.s.s together when this life--short at the very longest--should be over. She listened, and became quiet; and by-and-by, in answer to his questions, she found herself telling him of her brother's last days and words, and then, with a little burst of joyful tears, of Dan, and all that she hoped those days had brought to him.

Never since the old times, when she used "to empty her heart out" to Hamish, had she found such comfort in being listened to. When she came to the tea-table, after brushing away her tears, she seemed just as usual, Shenac Dhu thought; and yet not just the same, she found, when she looked again. She gave a little nod at her husband, who smiled back at her, and then she said softly to Mr Stewart,--

"You have done her good already."